ZSL London Zoo The Ark (1993)

Tea_and_Biology

Tea_and_Biology

Active Member
5+ year member
Hey all!

If anyone's curious, here are the four episodes of the 1993 BBC documentary 'The Ark' by Molly Dineen. They detail London Zoo's financial crisis during the early 90's and how that affected animals, staff and the society whilst management implemented their last-ditch efforts to save the place.

Thought some of y'all might enjoy!
 
Cheers :) it is a fascinating watch, with rather a lot of people appearing whose names - if not neccesarily their faces - would be recognised by Zoochatters!
 
Thanks for posting this, its been a fascinating watch.

I remember this being broadcast but watching it now with hindsight is very much an eye opener. I can't imagine any organisation being so open these days. Cameras were present in places I just couldn't imagine now, and to be honest there wasn't a great number of individuals that came out of it looking particularly good. Just one or two.

I think if anyone was shown this without being given the date as the early 90's most would have placed it much older. I'm sure both zoo and commercial worlds had progressed more than that at that point. Where did they get all of the old duffers in the society? It seemed more like the early 70's to me, and maybe that was the root of the society's problems.

Even Clinton Keeling who I'm aware is held in high regard came across as pompous and bloody minded. He knew full well which species of Panda was being referred to as did everyone else.

All in all though a fascinating watch, a real piece of history.
 
NigeW said:
Even Clinton Keeling who I'm aware is held in high regard came across as pompous and bloody minded. He knew full well which species of Panda was being referred to as did everyone else.
Click to expand...

I think everyone who held him in high regard would openly admit he *was* pompous and bloody minded :p

That said, I rather think the individuals appearing in the documentary who are held in the highest regard now are the much-missed Frank Wheeler and Doug Richardson, who of course is still with us - and both come out of the documentary looking a lot better than Keeling did.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top